leadership

Our Leadership Team

Our team at Brand Capital includes some of the most experienced minds that add value at every stage of interaction. They do so by way of ideating, articulating and establishing the business growth potential through the 'brand prism' in tandem with growth oriented entrepreneurs.

S. Sivakumar

S. Sivakumar is the President Revenue for The Times Group, heads Group’s Revenue (which arguably serves the largest India-focused advertiser base) & Brand Capital, the investment arm.

Siva as he is addressed, has been with the Times Group for over 27 years, started his career in the Finance organisation and has played a pivotal role in all its new business initiatives like internet, radio, TV, OOH ventures etc; and serves on the board of some of these companies. Prior to setting up and incubating Brand Capital, he held multiple responsibilities with the Group ranging from finance, strategy, mergers & acquisitions, business development to facilitating the setup of new businesses under the Times umbrella. Under the leadership of Siva, Brand Capital has become one of the largest private equity investors in India with total investments of over USD 3 billion.

Siva’s has led Brand Capital investments across sectors like retail, FMCG, realty, digital, mobile, e-tail, healthcare, auto, fin-tech, BFSI and consumer services. Siva has handpicked professionals for the various specialist cells at Brand Capital and each of the Avatars of Brand Capital has been instrumental in catapulting brand led growth for several ventures. Brand Capital has introduced the power of branding to over 850 indigenous brands helping them establish successful business models with strong consumer traction. Over the years, the Brand Capital business has evolved along with changing market conditions. while continuing to exude positive energy and optimism for the new-age entrepreneurs; inspiring risk taking with an unyielding emphasis on growth; stirring the pot and awakening the media industry to newer opportunities; and thus aiding brands to uncover their true value and achieve their growth vision. Under Siva, Brand Capital has consistently recorded double digit growths and has now become a key growth engine of the Indian media industry.

Siva is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India and the Institute of Cost Accountants of India. He is also a fitness enthusiast. He actively participates in marathons, triathlons around the world and coaches aspiring enthusiasts in his free time”. With such a diverse & long-standing career, Siva’s areas of expertise include Finance, Sales & Marketing, Family office, Business development, M & A, Corporate Strategy & Planning.

Sam Subramaniam

CEO, Brand Capital

An MBA from the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, Sam did his Engineering from IIT Madras and holds an MS from Vanderbilt University. He is a seasoned business leader with more than 27 years of experience in general management, business strategy, business development, investing, private equity and business turnarounds which includes time in New York, San Francisco Bay Area, Washington DC, Europe, Australia and over 10 years in India.

In the course of his career, Sam built and ran a Family Office, a private equity fund, a boutique investment bank. He served as strategic advisor to the CEO and Senior Management of American Express Company, worked as a banker at Goldman Sachs and as a consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton.

In his last assignment, Sam was associated with Sprout Growth Advisors as its founder and Managing Director besides serving as a senior advisor for a growing USD 25 billion financial services and Insurance business on their tech strategy, partnerships and JVs with high tech companies from the Silicon Valley area.

Arun Luharuka

Senior Vice President, Brand Capital

Arun Luharuka is a Chartered Accountant. He has over 20 years of experience and his career spans private equity investing, investment banking, consulting and equity research. He has a keen interest in sports, with hobbies that include running marathons, wildlife photography and travelling.

Arun started his career with an independent research firm and thereafter worked with Commence Concepts, ILFS Investsmart, Avendus and Templeton. His last assignment was as a Principal with the private equity arm of Franklin Templeton.

Neeraj Sanan

Neeraj Sanan is a PGDM in Finance and Marketing from IIM Bangalore and responsible for leading the Strategy, Licensing and Communication teams at Brand Capital. With over 20 years of work experience creating and building brands across consumer-facing businesses such as Asian Paints, ICI, Wrigley’s, Dabur, Network 18 and ABP News Network, Neeraj’s last assignment prior to joining BCCL was as Global CMO and Biz Dev JAPAC at Spire Technologies.

Neeraj has held several leadership positions in his career including Management Committee membership at ABP News Network (where he was instrumental in strategizing the launch of new businesses including a digital vertical) as well as investor at Spire Technologies. His skill lies in using disruptive marketing and data sciences / information systems to transform organizational culture and business processes.

Born and raised in Delhi, Neeraj has lived across a dozen Indian cities and towns. As an interpretivist keenly interested in philosophy, Neeraj closely follows developments in Artificial Intelligence, a subject he blogs about and evangelizes on social media. Neeraj is also currently pursuing a DBA from Manchester Business School, has an MED from Harvard Business School and contributes to Forbes.

Puneet Suri

Director, North

Puneet did his graduation in Engineering (Electronics & Communication) from Punjab Engineering College followed by an MBA from IIM-Ahmedabad. He has over twenty one years of work experience in private equity, principal investments and consulting. His advisory experience prior to private equity career focused on strategy, business planning, feasibility assessment, transaction origination, business valuation and implementation assistance.

Puneet started his career with Godrej Consumer Products Ltd. and thereafter worked for KSA Technopak, E & Y and A.T. Kearney. His last assignment was as Senior Vice President with Sun Group, a leading principal investor and private equity fund manager in Russia, India and other emerging markets.

Vish Sathappan

Director, South and East

With over 22 years of experience in Private Equity, Mergers & Acquisitions, Real Estate and Investment Banking, Vish, prior to joining BCCL, has been the Managing Director at AVKA Capital, boutique investment bank focusing on cross-border M&A transactions. He has also served as an Executive Director with TVS Capital, a domestic PE fund focusing on the domestic consumption theme. In addition, Vish had nearly spent 15 years with GE Capital both in the US and India primarily in Private Equity.

An Electrical Engineer from NIT Calicut, Vish has an MBA in Finance from the University of Alabama as well as a CFA charter holder.

Chandresh Sampat

Head – Springboard

Chandresh Sampat heads Springboard, the new strategic business initiative of BCCL.

Chandresh is a computer engineer with an MBA in Finance from the University of Pune. With a passionate flair for deal making, he has over 20 years of work experience across manufacturing, fintech, retail, luxury and venture capital. Over the last decade at Brand Capital, Chandresh has lead several key deals across both traditional and consumer-tech sectors.

Chandresh actively engages in business strategy and consumer insights with the top management of several of our investee companies helping them create and unlock shareholder value.

G Ramaswamy

National Head – Brand Estate

Ramaswamy Gopalkrishnan (Rama) is a certified Chartered Accountant and also a Company Secretary. Rama has over 25 years of experience in M&As as well as Investment Banking in companies like J M Financial & Investment Consultancy Ltd, Standard Chartered Bank, Aditya Birla Group and now investment experience at Brand Capital. During his current stint at Times Group he was part of the core team that put into operation the path breaking venture – Brand Capital, which now has investment of over Rs. 13000 cr. Ever since, he has been a key member of Senior Management team wearing several hats including being one of longest serving member of the Investment Committee.

Currently, Rama has moved to a business role and assumes responsibility at an All India level for the Brand Estate deals covering acquisition and divestment of real estate properties and media transaction; and overseas structuring of transactions and legal documentation.

Shishir Bhartia

Head – West

Shishir is a Chartered Accountant from Institute of Chartered Accountants England and Wales (ICAEW) and an alumnus of London School of Economics (LSE) with over 19 years of experience.
He started his career with Deloitte in London in the Audit and Assurance practice. Post which he joined his family business in India and aggressively expanded the warehousing and real estate activities along with an entrepreneurial venture into distribution, franchise network and retail of consumer durables and mobile handsets. In about 5 years he worked across Tier-2-3 markets and helped grow the consumer reach of leading partner brands.

He joined Brand Capital in 2008. He began with a focus on portfolios for Healthcare, Wellness and Education sectors which have been among the fastest growing Brand Capital portfolios. He works closely with Entrepreneurs and CXO teams of high growth potential early stage organisations to help them achieve exponential growth through mentoring, brand building, resource strengthening, business development and go to market strategies and applying best practices.

Rajesh Sharma

Director- Brand Capital

Rajesh Sharma director of Brand Capital, the new strategic business initiative of BCCL.

As part of the core Leadership Team and a permanent member of the Investment Committee, Rajesh helped establish & grow the unique & innovative business model of BRAND CAPITAL. With pan India investments like Mufti Apparels, HCG Oncology, Delta Corp, Noble Hygiene, Future Group, GTL etc., helped create a new generation of growth stories in India.

He had also set up and headed the Market Development function at Brand Capital which looked at creating new growth areas for Brand Capital and BCCL.

In his current role, he has helped set up Springboard which is a new concept and way of building large, scalable businesses of future, by funding the creation of “Asset light – Super Brands”! Springboard funds established companies, business houses, promoters and professionals to create their next level future growth stories! By encouraging and funding them to build Brands and businesses like Peri-Peri lingerie, Provogue Deodorants, GIO, Lifespan, Local Banya, Springboard is on its way to create the new Super Brands of India.

An Economist by education and trained in Capital Markets, Private Equity, Brands and Communication from leading institutions Rajesh started his career with his own ventures in Textiles, Tea, Education and Advertising.

Sameer Karulkar

Portfolio Growth & Exits Head

Sameer as the National Head currently leads the equity portfolio growth and exits team which manages the USD3b worth of Brand Capital portfolio of investments

The team under his leadership has been successfully driving exits each year through all avenues, be it through a listing process - both in India and US, through secondary sale and through strategic buyouts or JVs. The portfolio growth & exits team actively participates in growing/harvesting the individual portfolio companies to build them to the next level and strategically in-terms of also planning for and driving exits. Sameer, using his two decades of experience, also brings together early/growth stage/PE investors who are looking to co-invest in portfolio companies while also developing Global and Domestic strategic investors linkages for some of its portfolio companies.

Prior to joining Brand Capital, Sameer was a Vice President with SBI Capital Markets Limited where he led M&A, Private equity team and amongst others was also responsible for developing, building and managing the M&A International network, now called Oaklins, across 40 countries to facilitate growth for Indian corporates and also bring global strategic and financial investors to invest and grow in India. He has also served in the past organisations such as Haribhakti Corporate Finance and Mahindra & Mahindra limited. Sameer is an Production Engineer and has also completed his Master of Management Studies from Welingkar Institute of Management, Mumbai University.

Neville Taraporewalla

Neville is the President of BCCL Worldwide Inc based in the San Francisco Bay Area
and part of the leadership team that leads the US operations of media conglomerate
Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd (BCCL), The Times of India Group. An early adopter of the
consumer internet & digital landscape, Neville has a proven track record of building and
running online businesses for traditional media publishers & online media companies in
Emerging Markets of India & South Asia.

A Certified Executive Leadership Coach, he has held several Senior Executive
Leadership positions at Microsoft Corporation, Yahoo! Inc., Publicitas, Mid-Day
Multimedia Ltd & The Time of India Group.

Neville has been the Co-founder, past Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Internet and
Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) in 2004 & 2005. In 2011, 2012 & 2013 he was
included in the annual Campaign India ‘A’ list which showcased leaders in advertising,
marketing & the media Industry in India. IMPACT Digital 100 List of personalities 2012 &
2013 included Neville in the list of leaders who have contributed to the growth of digital
in India. An Angel investor to early stage start-up companies he plays a critical role of a
mentor & advisor; his portfolio of investments includes new media companies in the
travel, home services, personal wellness, audio processing, mobile application
development and augmented reality space in India & the US.

Brand Capital is part of Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd (BCCL) or the Times Group – India's no 1 media conglomerate and leaders in English and regional print media, TV, radio and digital media. The 179 years old Times Group, has cultivated a 360 degree spectrum of media assets and owns and manages The Times of India, Times Now, city-centric Mirrors, The Economic Times, ET Now, Maharashtra Times, Navbharat Times, Vijay Karnataka, Radio Mirchi, Times Music, Times OOH and indiatimes.com, to name a few.